Once in a Lifetime
by Laurie M
Summary: Five times Audrey fforbes-Hamilton didn't marry Richard DeVere – and one time she did.
1. The Auction

**_Once in a Lifetime_**

_1.__The Auction_

_Grantleigh Manor, 1979_

'Sold, to Mrs Audrey fforbes-Hamilton!'

Audrey felt her body slump; a breath of relief that seemed to have risen from her toes escaped her lips and for one moment she closed her eyes. Safe. Grantleigh was safe. It was hers and no-one could take it away from her, ever.

God bless Greville Hartley, she thought. Whatever it was that had made him add to the already considerable sum he had given her for the auction, she didn't know; but it had made all the difference.

Audrey opened her eyes and rose, amidst murmurs from both her supporters and detractors, to claim what was hers.

'Congratulations.'

It was a bit much, she thought, being congratulated on buying your own house back; especially coming from the man who had been hell bent on buying it from under her. Audrey regarded him with a quelling eye.

At least, it should have been a quelling eye, but the man did not seem amenable to quelling. He returned her gaze with a sort of amused tolerance that was wildly annoying. And oddly attractive.

But he was taking defeat graciously and Audrey decided to rise above petty considerations and be gracious in return.

'Thank you, Mister… Uh…'

'DeVere.'

She smiled tightly. 'Of course. Not too disappointed, I trust?'

He shrugged lightly. 'There are other houses.'

Audrey couldn't stop herself. 'But none like Grantleigh.' She loved it. More than anything in the world, she loved it.

'No, I can see that.' He was still looking at her, his eyes taking her in. 'Why doesn't the loser buy you lunch? A civilised end.'

'Oh.' Started, she blinked at him. 'That's very kind, Mister DeVere, but I have rather a lot to do.' And thanks to Uncle Greville's generosity, she even had a little left over to actually do some of it.

Was it a flicker of disappointment she saw cross those handsome features? 'Of course. Well, goodbye, Mrs fforbes-Hamilton. And good luck.'

'Honestly, Aud, why on earth didn't you say yes?' Marjory's tone was incredulous, but her eyes were fixed on the enigmatic Mr DeVere, who was exchanging pleasantries with the rector.

'Why would I?'

'Look at him! He's gorgeous.'

'Well, if you think so highly of him, you have lunch with him.'

'He didn't ask me,' Marjory said sadly.

One lunch might not be so bad, Audrey thought. After all, he seemed pleasant enough. And he wasn't exactly difficult to look at. It was a long time since she had lunched with a handsome man.

Had she ever, in fact? Not just handsome, but attractive – they weren't always the same thing, but Richard (she was fairly certain that was his name) DeVere might just be both.

For a moment she thought of following his retreating figure, telling him she had changed her mind. But the moment lengthened and he had passed beyond the portico and then gone.

Audrey sighed.

'Come on,' she said to Marjory, 'you can have lunch with me.'

Marjory brightened instantly. 'Gosh, thanks Aud.'

The lady of the manor and her best friend; and that, Audrey thought, was just how it would be.


	2. Largo al Factotum

_2\. __Largo al Factotum_

_London, 1956_

Being let loose in London sounded like decadence on the same level as sleeping past noon.

Although, they were, strictly speaking, on a school trip. And it was a matinée performance of an opera that they were there for. And they were only allowed to explore the environs of Covent Garden. But at sixteen, and feeling very grown up, for Audrey and her friends it was heaven.

Audrey wandered through the stalls. It was like Grantleigh on market day, only with far more shouting and colourful language than she was used to and the crush of people was probably far more than entire village altogether.

It was exhilarating.

So many vendors, who mainly seemed to be selling the same thing, but she was drawn to one stall in particular; not just because the fruit happened to be arranged in a more visually pleasing manner, but because the seller of said fruit was announcing his wares in a cut-glass accent that seemed markedly out of place.

Audrey couldn't help but stop and stare at him. A few years older than herself, she thought, but still very young. Dark hair, dark eyes, and a glinting smile that broadened into a full grin when he saw her.

'What can I get for you?'

'Oh!' Audrey cursed the burning spots of colour she could feel in her cheeks. She so wanted to be cool and aloof and sophisticated and show this boy with the dancing eyes that she was wholly unaffected by his good looks and amused smile. 'I, er, I'd like some grapes, please.'

Of course, her voice would have to come out as a squeak.

'Right you are.'

'Do you always work here?'

He glanced up at her. 'Why?'

Her cheeks burned more and if she had known really bad swear words, she would have been using them at herself and her blasted cheeks.

'No reason. Just wondering.'

His eyes crinkled. 'Only during the holidays. It's my father's stall – I work here when I'm not at university.'

'Oh, I see! What are you reading?'

'Economics.'

It sounded terrifyingly important and grown up. The young man placed a bunch of grapes on the scale, regarded them thoughtfully, and added a few more.

'Do you like it?'

He shrugged slightly. 'It's interesting. I wonder about the people who wanted to be economists in the first place, but I suppose there are worse ways of making a living.'

He was a strange boy. She knew boys who were up at Oxford – like her cousin, Marton, for instance – but there was never any talk of them 'making a living' out of what they studied. Audrey wasn't entirely convinced that they actually studied at all.

'So why are you in the Garden in the middle of the day?'

'We're here for the opera.' She tried to sound grand but it didn't quite come off; to be honest, the prospect was a bit of a chore.

'Oh? What are you going to see?'

'_The Barber of Seville_,' she said gloomily.

The dark eyes shone at her and Audrey felt her breath hitch in her chest.

'I saw it last week. It's marvellous - you'll love it!'

She was uncertain. 'Will I?'

'Of course!' Her grapes forgotten, he leaned both arms against the counter of his stall and looked at her intently. 'It's very funny. And while you're watching it, you can think of me, especially when Figaro's on.'

'Who?'

His eyes widened. 'Figaro! He's the barber. He comes on with this wonderful aria – that's the solo-'

'I know what an aria is!' Audrey rolled her eyes.

He grinned at her. 'Well, he comes on and sings about how put upon he is and how he has to do everything for everyone and solve all of their problems and has no time for himself because he's always running around. Right? So, when he starts, just substitute the name Richard for Figaro and that will be me.'

Audrey, giggling, pressed her hand against her mouth to try and stop the eruption but it was too much. Her new friend started laughing, too, and it was a pleasant sound.

'Bedrich!' A stentorian voice overrode everything else. It belonged to a large man with a strong, handsome, face and a fearsome moustache. 'Stop flirting with the pretty girls and look after your customers!'

'She is a customer!' he protested.

'Bedrich…'

'Yes, Papa.'

Audrey frowned. 'I thought your name is Richard.'

'It is. Bedrich is what my parents still call me.'

'Oh…'

'It's Czechoslovakian.'

The large man was regarding his son with a withering eye that Richard, or Bedrich, or whatever he was called, seemed to ignore completely.

'So, when Figaro comes on, I should think of Bedrich?'

He looked pained. 'If you make it Richard, you can have these grapes for free.'

Audrey cast another dubious glance at the mountain-sized Czechoslovakian fruit seller, who was now solicitously weighing out peaches for an elderly lady.

'Won't your father mind?'

'Probably,' he said cheerfully.

She smiled shyly. 'All right. Richard.'

He flashed her another of those glinting smiles and Audrey drifted away, clutching a brown paper bag nearly bursting with grapes. She could hear him whistling a jaunty tune as she went.

'I say, he's a corker!' Podge Hodge had clearly discovered the stall that sold cream cakes and was taking an enthusiastic bite out of one. She was staring at the young man weighing out apples with evident appreciation.

'Oh, gosh, he is!' Marjory Frobisher, more pink than usual, gazed at Audrey's grape provider and her eyes went starry. 'Who is he?'

'Oh, that's Richard,' Audrey said carelessly and rejoiced that for once in her life her cheeks cooperated and remained the colour they were supposed to. 'He's reading economics. He's from Czechoslovakia.'

Marjory's eyes widened even further than Audrey had thought possible.

'You know, I could do with some fruit,' Marjory murmured.

Audrey caught her arm. 'We'll be late for the opera. You can share my grapes.'

When the house lights had gone down and the orchestra started, most of Audrey's form set about passing messages to one another up and down the aisle. Audrey, munching her grapes, paid more attention to the proceedings on stage than she would ordinarily and she had to admit that it was more entertaining than she had thought it would be. And then a stocky baritone swaggered onto the stage and started singing the tune that Richard had whistled at her a few hours before and Audrey burst out laughing.

It earned her reproving glares from her teacher (but an unseen look of gratitude from the baritone, who had a morbid dislike of schoolgirl audiences at matinée performances) and for years afterwards, Audrey could never hear that piece without smiling.


	3. A Match Made in the Financial Times

_3\. __A Match Made in the Financial Times_

_Grantleigh Manor Lodge, 1981_

The deep sigh that emerged from behind the _Times_caught Audrey's attention.

'What is it?'

'Oh, nothing.' Marjory lowered the paper slightly, peered over the top with a slightly guilty expression. 'I was just looking at a picture in the paper.'

Audrey, grappling with a darning needle, was grateful for an excuse to put it down. While she liked to think of herself as a practical person, she had never been keen on make-do and mend, but the severe lack of funds meant that even her most worn clothes were having to be patched, mended and reconstituted as best she could. She hadn't quite resigned herself to being the unkempt lady of a certain age covered in dog hair, but it was getting close.

She dropped her mending. 'Anyone we know?'

'Hm?' The enquiry rose from behind the paper.

'I'm assuming it's a wedding – you only ever sigh like that over weddings. You shouldn't read the register, Marjory, it depresses you.'

Marjory lowered the paper again and responded with wounded dignity. 'I am not reading the register – I am reading the financial pages.'

'_Fin_ance,' Audrey said, appalled at the blatant Americanisms creeping into Marjory's pronunciation. It would be bad enough under any circumstances, but given the current situation, it was untenable.

'Why on earth are you reading the financial pages, anyway?'

'I take an interest in the world!'

Audrey held her gaze, one eyebrow raised.

'Oh, all right, I was looking for the register and landed on that page by mistake.'

'Ah!' Audrey was triumphant, and then frowned. 'Since when do they show marriages in the financial pages?'

'I don't think they do, usually,' Marjory said, 'but they're both heads of companies and they're both terribly good looking.'

Audrey sat forward slightly, increasingly bewildered. 'Just what sort of marriage is this?'

Marjory blinked at her. 'The usual sort.'

'Oh, let me see this photograph.'

Audrey crossed to the sofa, took the newspaper out of Marjory's hands and studied the image that was the source of so much interest.

They were a remarkably striking couple. The woman was almost ludicrously beautiful, all high-cheekbones and catlike eyes. He was undeniably handsome, tall and dark-haired into the bargain. It was like a Hollywood casting director had been given the job of deciding what a pair of company directors should look like.

'Richard DeVere and Claudine DuToit…'

'She makes that lovely scent – DuToit Peut-être.'

'I doubt she stands brewing it herself.'

Marjory tutted. 'You know what I mean.'

Audrey scanned the short paragraph. The founding head of Cavendish Foods… The heiress of a cosmetics firm…

Some people had all the luck. The only thing she had inherited were debts and they had lost her her home. No-one had left her a profitable company and there was certainly no handsome millionaire waiting to marry her.

Even in the grainy black-and-white photograph there was a discernible humour in his eyes, a warmth in his face that was more attractive than even his handsome features.

'Imagine if he had bought Grantleigh,' Marjory said dreamily.

Audrey snorted. 'Life isn't like that. Anyway, we don't know anything about him. He'd probably be just as bad.'

'I thought you said anyone would be better than-'

'Do not mention that man's name!'

Four hundred years and then some unspeakable American came along and turned Grantleigh into a hotel.

'Do you know he's now claiming to be some sort of relative? As though a fforbes-Hamilton would ever be an American.'

'It is possible, I suppose,' Marjory said and then flinched under her friend's glare. 'Sorry, Aud.'

Audrey pulled her cardigan closer around her shoulders, glanced longingly at the fireplace. It was terribly cold but it would have to get a lot colder before she could justify the cost of lighting the fire. She started to close the curtains and stopped, staring across the field at the familiar, beloved outline of Grantleigh Manor, lights blazing in what were now any number of bedrooms let out to anyone who wanted to stay there. The tenant cottages turned into holiday homes.

It was a tantalising fantasy, to think that there might have been a millionaire out there with principles and standards, someone who would turn Grantleigh back into what it should have been. Someone who would care about the people and the land and want the best for it.

Audrey sighed and closed the curtains sharply. Fantasies were useless. And life really wasn't like that.

Her eyes fell on the newspaper, still open on the same page. Probably no real romance there, she told herself; a purely business arrangement.

But the happiness in their faces looked real and Audrey felt a stab of longing. She folded up the paper and rang the bell for tea.


	4. Bad Timing

_4.__Bad Timing_

_Grantleigh Manor Lodge, 1981_

'Miss Frobisher, Madam.' Brabinger's voice inserted itself into the room.

'Hello, Marjory,' Audrey called, not looking up. The sitting room was as close to chaotic as its owner would allow. She was quite happy to help in any way with the OAP club – well, perhaps not happy, exactly, but it was her duty – and every surface was covered in papers, flyers, bags, bottles of water.

'Mrs Poo has been trying to call you, she couldn't get through.'

'No, the phone's out of order,' she said, with a sort of resigned cheerfulness. There was a loud sniff and Audrey glanced over at Marjory. Come high summer, come Marjory's hay fever and this year looked to be no different: streaming eyes and a pink nose. It had been gloriously sunny the last few days, which was wonderful, but Audrey was counting on it lasting until the weekend and smiled to herself at the prospect.

'I'll pop up to the manor once I've finished up with this lot.'

'You should go now.' Marjory was still standing in the middle of the room, her hands gripping the wooden handles of her bag hard, the knuckles white under the strain. 'It's Richard.'

'Oh, what now?' Audrey continued stuffing the requisite items into bags. 'If he's started on the hedgerows again-'

'There was a car crash.'

Audrey straightened, fast, looked at Marjory fully. It wasn't normal hay fever. Her face was too puffy. Marjory seemed to steady herself, moistened her lips. Her voice was too high and too clear when she spoke.

'It was a drunk driver… Ploughed into his car.'

Audrey let go of the things she had been holding and for a moment her breath stopped, catching, and then she pulled in the air. 'Well, we must go and see him.'

'No, Aud.' Marjory's voice broke, her face quivering. 'He's de-'

'No!' She started searching for her bag, fumbling through the endless piles of rubbish that were covering everything. 'You've got it wrong, Marjory, as usual. I'll go and see Mrs Poo myself.'

'Audrey, Richard is dead.'

'You're wrong! You-'

They were going out this weekend. A picnic to make up for the one that had ended so disastrously.

'Nothing too fancy,' he said, his dark eyes glittering warmly. 'It always seems to go horribly wrong otherwise. I'll keep it simple.'

'Do you think you can manage that?'

'Just a hamper with sandwiches.' He paused. 'Maybe one bottle of champagne.'

She laughed. 'Really, you are incorrigible!'

'Is that a yes? This weekend?'

A pause, a salutary show that she wasn't so easily won over, but they both knew that she was. 'All right. This weekend.'

All the things he said that he wanted to tell her. So many things that she wanted to say to him. She should have just said the words. But that was for the man to make the first move, he had to be the one to say it first. And maybe he would have if she hadn't given him endless reasons to believe that she didn't think he was good enough.

So many times when she could have told him that she loved him, more than anything. That he was everything she had ever dreamed of and more.

Her breath was hitching, the world sliding sideways, the floor rushing up to meet her and then Marjory's arm, surprisingly strong, around her waist, holding her up.

They made it to the sofa, crushing the bags that Audrey had prepared.

'I never told him.'

'I know.'

'I should have told him.'

Tears blurred Marjory's face. Audrey tried to pull in more air but her lungs were constricted, scalded, every half-breath hurt.

Five minutes. Just five minutes more so that she could tell him, so she could hear him say it. It wasn't supposed to be like this. They were supposed to have more time and it had never occurred to her that it was the one thing they would run out of.


	5. Cheek to Cheek

_5.__Cheek to Cheek_

_London, 1980_

Audrey pushed open the doors to the terrace, stepped out, and drew the first clear breath she had all evening. The cool air snapped against her cheeks and she welcomed the chill after the stultifying reception rooms. Music, the hum of conversation and laughter drifted out after her, but she was mercifully, blissfully, alone.

Her head tilted back, eyes closing. The air was scented with summer flowers, sweet, with a promise of rain behind it and another scent that was familiar but that she couldn't quite place. Some of the tension left her shoulders and she tilted her head from side to side, shrugging out the stiffness caused from holding herself so coiled for so long. She took a few steps towards the balustrade, getting a better view across the garden.

'Bloody awful party, isn't it?'

The voice emerged from the shadows slightly behind and to the right of her and Audrey started violently, spinning around. She saw movement – hands raising, placating.

'I'm sorry – I didn't mean to frighten to you.' A man's silhouette at the table and the red glow of a cigar. That had been the undefinable aroma mingling with the heady garden scents.

'Not at all,' Audrey responded, holding her chin high.

He unfolded himself from his chair, stepped into the faint illumination from the terrace lights and she recognised him from earlier in the evening. He was hard to overlook: taller than most of the other men, certainly more athletic in build and most definitely better looking.

'I am right about the party, though.' Something in the mellow gentleness of his voice….

Audrey hesitated. 'Yes.' It felt good to say it out loud. 'It's a terrible party!' She glanced back towards the doors leading back inside and shivered. 'Still, my husband seems to be enjoying it.' He would, of course. It was just up his ghastly street.

A pause. 'Ah.'

She looked him over. A man like him would not be unattached, and while she was all right to make small talk with a personable male, she still had some moral standards.

'Isn't your wife having a good time?'

Another pause. 'My wife died a few years ago.'

Audrey felt her whole body stiffen and she cursed herself. 'I'm so sorry, I-'

'It's all right, you weren't to know. But for the record, she would have hated it.' He smiled at her, eyes glittering as he took another pull on his cigar, smoke encircling them both. 'Why do we do it to ourselves? Well, I know why I do it – business networking. Horrible phrase. Sometimes I think I'd be better off chucking it all in and buying a farm.'

She couldn't help but laugh. Anyone who looked less like a farmer she was yet to see. 'Do you know much about farming?'

'Practically nothing,' he said cheerfully. 'But a man can dream. Besides, I have a healthy admiration for farmers – if it weren't for them, I wouldn't have a business.'

'And what is your business?'

'Cavendish Foods.'

The name was familiar. 'That's the supermarkets, isn't it?'

He nodded.

'Ah, so you work for them?'

'In a manner of speaking.' Faint amusement in his tone. 'It's my company.'

She frowned. 'You mean you own it?'

He smiled at her around his cigar.

'Well, that's, uh…'

'Lucrative.'

Audrey couldn't help a breath of laughter. She wasn't accustomed to people being so forthright about things like that. Her initial thought was that it was rather vulgar. The second thought, almost before the first was finished, was that he was far too charming to be vulgar. 'I can see why the party must be something of a chore – no escape from business talk.'

'It's my own fault entirely for accepting. It's Audrey, isn't it?'

She blinked rapidly, startled. 'Yes. How-'

'I asked. I should have asked a bit more – I hadn't counted on a husband, but I suppose I should have known, really.'

She was grateful for the darkness that hid the sudden burn she could feel spreading across her cheeks. It was a long time since anyone had looked at her like that.

'But you're quite safe,' he continued, 'chasing married women isn't really my line.'

'Oh? Well, that's … reassuring.'

He stubbed out the remnant of his cigar. 'It's not in the gentleman's code.'

Audrey raised a sceptical eyebrow. 'You'd be surprised by some gentlemen.'

A soft laugh greeted that. 'Probably.'

Audrey pulled back suddenly. 'I don't know your name!'

Her handsome stranger shook his head sorrowfully. 'Just when I was priding myself on my impeccable conduct. Honestly, my manners get worse and worse – they're a sad trial to me. Richard DeVere.' She took the hand he extended.

'Audrey fforbes-Hamilton.'

He had been about to release her hand but his fingers tightened around hers again. 'Not as in Mrs fforbes-Hamilton's Bee Eater Honey?'

She smiled, delighted. 'Yes! Oh! Cavendish Food is one of our stockists.'

'I know it is. My mother refuses to eat any other brand. She won't even eat mine!'

'How disloyal!'

'It's shocking.'

'My honey is very good, though,' she said, reasonably.

'So is mine,' he informed her with dignity. 'Well, well…' His eyes wandered over her again. 'I always thought it was a wonderful brand name – very upmarket – but it never occurred to me that there was an actual Mrs fforbes-Hamilton.' A beat. 'They should use you in the advertising.'

'Why?' Of all the ridiculous ideas.

'You'd appeal to a very wide customer base.'

Audrey swallowed hard, tried to keep her tone light. 'Are you always this flirtatious with your suppliers?'

He didn't answer straight away. 'No…' It came out on a breath. 'No, I'm not. Not with anyone, really.'

The traces of humour had vanished from his face. He was completely serious, Audrey realised. And he still had hold of her hand. She dropped her gaze.

'I thought you didn't chase married women, Mister DeVere.'

He sighed. 'I despair of my manners tonight – don't know what I've done with the damn things. You can call me Richard, you know.'

One corner of her mouth curled upwards. 'No first name basis on first acquaintance.'

'Oh,' he nodded wisely, 'yes, I see.'

It was the champagne, she told herself. Too much champagne and the tedium of yet another evening spent with Marton's appalling friends, that was what kept her out on the terrace with a man she didn't know but whose eyes danced with a fire and humour that she could easily lose herself in.

They faced each other, the scent of night stocks rising on the air; she had to stand close to him to see the modelling of his temple and cheekbone, the way his hair curled slightly just above the collar. The glint in those dark eyes.

She wondered what it was that he had seen when he looked at her, what it was about her that had him interested enough to ask her name. She had been propositioned before; usually by Marton's friends, who appeared to view other men's wives as one of the perks of having been at Oxford together.

This wasn't like that. Richard DeVere was not propositioning her – worse luck – but he was also looking at her in a way that few men had before. If she had been free, she wouldn't give it a second thought. She was barely giving it a first thought now.

Music still spilled out and the rapid tipple had slowed to something more sentimental. It suited moonlight and brief encounters.

'Before I do remember my manners,' he said, his voice low, 'could I persuade you to at least one dance?'

She nodded acquiescence and was drawn into an embrace that was far too close to be either permissible or desirable when not on a first name basis. The correct thing to do would be to push him away and either demand that he behave in a gentleman-like manner, or take herself back indoors.

Audrey slid her arm around his neck and rested her head on his shoulder. She could feel his breath against her hair, against her cheek and she knew she would have to move only very slightly and she would have his lips against hers. She could swear that she could feel them brush her skin. His fingers pressed in just below her ribs.

This was how affairs started, she thought. Too much champagne at a tedious party and then an encounter with a handsome stranger. He didn't chase married women, he had told her, and she believed him, but there was also the thought that maybe he would make an exception.

She raised her head and saw it in his eyes: the thought. Temptation. She had gone willingly into his arms and she could see all of the possibilities arising from that.

The music ended and after a moment he released her gently.

'I should probably go back in.'

'Yes.'

She could put the burn in her cheeks down to the snap of cold air. Not that Marton would notice, anyway, which was really just as well.

'It's been a pleasure,' she said, soft, and meant it.

He inclined his head and she could feel his eyes still on her as she walked away.

'Goodnight, Mrs fforbes-Hamilton .'

At the door she stopped, looked back for the last time. 'Goodnight, Richard.'


	6. From this Moment On

_6.__From this Moment On_

_Grantleigh, 1982_

'Are we ready?' Audrey adjusted the veil on her hat.

'Ready! Gosh, this is exciting!' Flushed and breathless, Marjory looked as happy as though it were she getting married. Audrey gave her and indulgent smile and Marjory took her place in front of the doors, grasping her bouquet tightly.

'Ready, Brabinger?'

'Indeed, Madam. If I may?' He offered Audrey his arm and she took it graciously, giving him a smile of undisguised gratitude and affection.

It had raised a number of eyebrows, the news that Audrey fforbes-Hamilton, lady of the manor, was to be given away by her butler. The fact was that out of her surviving male relatives, there wasn't one to whom she felt close enough and for whom she felt the esteem that was due the person playing that role in her wedding. There was the Brigadier, of course, but while she was fond of him, he hadn't ever been a fatherly figure to her.

Which left Brabinger, who knew her better than anyone, who had stood by her regardless of circumstance, who had seen at her worst and still loved her. Richard had declared it to be an eminently sensible idea, and so that had been that.

Brabinger had taken the request with his customary discretion; privately, he was overjoyed.

He nodded to the verger, the church doors were opened and the small party began their stately procession down the aisle.

For what was a small wedding, the church still seemed packed, the air heavy with the combined scents of roses and peonies. It looked as though every florist in Somerset had been relieved of their stock of those particular flowers. Faces smiled at her. Jack Spalding and Sally Henderson, their own engagement recently announced, seemed wreathed in extra happiness. Sonia Thuyssen, looking, as always, as though she had stepped off the cover of _Vogue_– an effect slightly marred by the broad grin she was wearing. Audrey smiled back.

Maria Polouvicka, already dabbing at her eyes, Ferdy at her side patting her knee comfortingly.

The rector, beatific, hands clasped together.

And Richard.

He had refused point blank to wear a morning suit before the subject had even been raised, stating that he didn't want to get married looking like an undertaker.

Personally, Audrey thought he would look very well in one, but given Brabinger's starring role in the ceremony, they were already off to an unconventional start and some traditions – as her husband-to-be never tired of telling her – were not worth fighting to keep.

He looked, as always, perfect, the austere dark suit emphasising his good looks. Audrey felt her insides perform a strange, melting lurch and she was grateful for Brabinger's steady arm supporting hers. She just about noticed the best man, Sonia's husband, Michael, give her a smile and a nod and she returned it before her attention was returned fully to Richard.

'You look wonderful,' he murmured.

'So do you,' she whispered back.

Wearing white for a second wedding was also not the tradition, but this was a new start and her chic suit was a world away from the frothy concoctions that passed as wedding dresses these days.

Brabinger withdrew, first bestowing on her hands a gentle squeeze that carried the lifetime of devotion he had given her.

They exchanged their vows, voices clear and confident as they made their promises to each other. Audrey concentrated on her words, on keeping the medium-sized family of butterflies that had taken up residence in her stomach under control, and on matching Richard's magisterial calm.

It was only when he placed the ring on her finger that she felt the tremor in his hands and she grasped them tightly, almost relieved to realise that he was as nervous she was.

And then they were husband and wife.

It was the first wedding Audrey had been to where the congregation burst into a round of applause at that final declaration.

Applause, and yes, that was Sonia with her fingers in her mouth, producing an ear-splitting whistle that delighted her two sons and made the rector wince. Audrey was starting to share her husband's – _her husband! – _opinion that Sonia was, in the nicest possible way, bonkers.

They were doused with the requisite confetti and rice on the steps of the church and then the whole party started the walk up to the manor.

It was a sweet spring day, the sky a glorious hazy blue and the trees dressed in the freshest of greens.

Once Richard had finished brushing the rice out of his hair he took Audrey's arm, his fingers lacing through hers. They walked slowly, a little much-needed distance opening up between them and the rest of the congregation.

'You know, this is the first time in my life that I won't be Audrey fforbes-Hamilton?'

'Audrey DeVere,' he said, trying it out. 'I think it sounds rather good.' There was a familiar gleam in those dark eyes of his.

Audrey tilted her head. 'Yes, it could be worse.'

His lips twitched. 'Like Audrey Polouvicka.' He lingered over the syllables.

'Audrey Polouvicka…' A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. 'That sounds terribly exotic. I might take it up instead.'

Richard was still thinking it over. 'It sounds like the name of a Bond girl.'

She stopped, looking up at him enquiringly. 'Good or bad?'

His voice took on that honeyed, husky timbre that always made every nerve-ending quiver. 'Well, you know what they say about bad girls and fun.'

Audrey raised her eyebrows slightly. 'You obviously haven't heard what they say about good girls.'

'Oh?'

'That they're just bad girls who haven't been caught.'

His eyes widened in faked shock. 'Mrs DeVere!'

She laughed lightly and then tilted her head back as his lips found hers and she leaned into him.

'Richard! Audrey!' Marjory waved at them frantically. 'Come on, it's time for the photographs.'

Richard sighed, picked the remaining pieces of confetti off her veil. 'We could make a run for it – the cars are just over there.'

'Richard…'

He smiled, hands running gently down her arms. 'There. You're perfect. Are you ready?'

She slipped her arm through his. 'For anything.'


End file.
